


In Spite of All the Danger...

by ThatwasJustaDream



Category: Hawaii Five-0 (2010)
Genre: Community: 1_million_words, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-09
Updated: 2013-03-27
Packaged: 2017-12-04 17:24:56
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 9
Words: 5,097
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/713200
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThatwasJustaDream/pseuds/ThatwasJustaDream
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Danny flies 5,947 miles, and tells himself it's just to <i>see</i> him, to make sure Steve is okay. What he really wants is for him to come home- no matter what shape he's in, and in spite of all the danger to Danny's heart.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Heart Digresses

The vacation resort’s outdoor restaurant boasts delicious scents of food and flowers, plush seats, an ocean view but none of them are why Danny's first for breakfast, last to leave. 

His sole reason is at the bar pouring coffee and breakfast cocktails. 

Danny can barely make out the soft smiles he’s giving the waitresses as they zip around him, the familiar contours of biceps and triceps. But even from here, he knows the set of those shoulders. His heart digresses, wonders if anyone’s benefitting from being held in those arms these days. 

He shakes himself, looks away.

“Howzit?” A text message on the phone in his hand. “RU okay?”

Kono. Up and awake back home at 5:00 a.m.? He calls her.

“Say it. I shouldn’t have flown here.”

“Can’t do that to you, Danny,” he hears that she hears he’s stressed. “Talk with him yet?”

“No. Can’t. Shit, it hit me– I’ll be lying to him. I had to… needed to _see_ he’s okay.”

“Then don’t lie to him,” Kono cuts in. “Tell him who you are, why you’re there. He won’t hate on you for caring.”

“You’re right. Thanks.”

She’s right. He’ll do it. At lunch, he’ll march right up and sit at that bar.


	2. A Long Way to Fall...

Danny thinks it auspicious the place is quiet at lunch; only two tables going, one couple at the bar. He stands on the cement steps leading to the restaurant and watches Steve stocking up, entering stuff into a laptop.

Watches and remembers.

_“ **Hold on**.” Five stories; a long way to fall. Danny’s ass is on the hot tar mac next to the parking garage, Steve heavy in his arms, bleeding from an ear, a vacant eye. He hears sirens, panic behind them as he kisses that forehead, growls softly…. “Steven, you **listen** to my voice and fucking **stay with** us …” _

Danny takes the most central seat at the bar, watches him finish up a task that has him swearing under his breath. Steve has an ‘aha’ moment, waves a hand in victory and spins.

“Lunch menu. Drink menu.” He hands Danny two gated folders. “Sorry. I’m the manager, not the bartender. She’s out sick. And I’m slow at this.” 

Jesus, his throat is glued together. He can’t answer, he can’t…

“Thank you,” Danny coughs it out, opens the lunch menu. Steve does him a favor and turns back to the bar to keep working. “Anything contagious? Your bartender?”

“Morning sickness,” Steve says lightly. “So no, there’s no need to fear drinking out of our glasses. It’s high season, and I can’t get a replacement. That’s my problem. First time in St. John?”

“Yes,” Danny says.

_“Damage to the hippocampus. Frontal cortex. Can’t land that hard and not have an impact.” The doctors explain it, and it still makes no sense. How can he wake up and be able to recite chapter and verse of the navy regs but not remember Kono, Chin… him? For Steve, after the accident the facts are clear but the people, they’re gone. Wiped. Strangers. **Loving** strangers who are hurting for him while he feels … nothing for them. Not because he doesn’t want to. Because he can’t._

The wave of relief that visibly goes through Steve when he hears his customer is new here? Only a detective would notice it. Danny doesn’t have it in his heart to ease his mind and then drop a bomb on him. 

“Here from New York. Getting away from February in the Northeast.”

“Amen to that,” Steve takes his lunch order. Steve. Takes his freaking. Lunch order.

“Here for the week?” Steve asks. 

“I booked two.” Danny says. “But I’m not sure I can stay….”

“You should,” Steve says. “No one takes real vacations anymore. And it’s beautiful here, there’s a lot to enjoy.”

“Maybe you could show me around?” Danny can’t believe how thin his own voice sounds. Terrified. Anyone not knowing the actual reason why might think he’s trying a come on that’s outside his comfort zone.

“Sure,” Steve grabs his water glass, grinning self-consciously, and fuck he’s blushing a little. “That could be fun. If you stay.”

Danny was ready to run a minute ago. Now he’s not sure how he’ll ever leave St. John.


	3. Ephemeral (Just for Today)

Danny prayed for the good health of the bartender and every resort employee the next morning, sure their plans would get trashed. But here Steve was, walking into the lobby in a dark golf shirt and, Danny smiled, cargos in place of the work slacks. He was crisp and pressed, and _shit_ he must be running twice as much as he used to ‘cause the man looked taut.

Danny fought the change in blood flow the mere sight brought on. This was about making sure he was happy. Well. About being with him, around him, if only for a day.

“You didn’t bring a camera?” Steve reached in for half a ‘hello’ hug and yeah, that didn’t help either, the too-brief sensation of being pressed to him. “We’re headed for some world-class views.”

“It’s okay,” Danny patted the phone in his pocket. “I’m not a world-class photographer. This’ll do it.”

They spent hours driving, then cut inland to a lunch shack three feet wide that served amazing chicken and conch fritters. Danny got a history lesson about the island and a long look at Steve and yeah-- he was happy. And loose. Free. There was no weight of the world on this man’s shoulders.

“You like living here?” Danny asked him.

They were at a beach bar, a ‘toes in the sand, beer in your hand’ kind of place. Danny was staring at the ocean when he asked it, looked back to Steve when he didn’t get a fast answer.

And oh, hell, Steve was staring at him in a way that made him feel… exposed.

“You’re not here from New York.” Steve said, and Danny slumped a little in his chair, shook his head. “Are you… are you Danny?”

He nodded this time and saw a look cross Steve’s face – part sorrow, part pity, part relief.

“Where did I fuck up?”

“You’ve got too much of a tan for a New Yorker in February,” Steve picked at the label on his beer bottle. “And you’re not asking me first date questions. Because you know where I’m from, you know all the things you ask a first date. And I’m glad you didn’t ask me that shit, ‘cause it means you didn’t want to lie to me. You only wanted to be with me. And I appreciate it, but nothing's....”

“Do you remember me? At all?”

Danny was sorry immediately, the way it deepened the sorrow and drained the relief from those eyes.

“No. I keep a journal…”

“I know. You started it before you left.”

“I read the first few notebooks regularly. It’s the only way to make my life make sense. So I know how much I hurt you when I left. And I know it’s been almost a year….”

“And?” Danny asked it as gently as he could when Steve stopped there.

“I know you don't get why I couldn't stay."

“You can tell me now. Help me understand?”

“Finish your beer,” Steve sat back. “Then we’ll go to my place. And you can read it for yourself.”


	4. Hopes, Fears, A Decision

“Ever watch the movie ‘Memento’?” Danny asked. “It’s about a guy who can’t make new memories. He tattoos words on himself.”

Steve stood picking through Moleskine notebooks on a shelf. He lived in a suite where he worked. A nice suite, but still - a hotel room.

“Does it have a happy ending?” Steve gestured for Danny to join him on the couch. 

“No,” Danny sat. “Sure doesn’t.”

Steve handed Danny a book filled with lists – appointments with his counselor, work hours, TV shows watched, movies, all in his spidery cursive.

“Fifty First Dates,” Danny pointed. “Underlined and circled for emphasis.”

“Yeah. It’s funny. It helps. I try to keep my entertainment light.”

“Has anything from before the accident come back?” 

Steve shook his head, flipping through another notebook and Danny took the opportunity to look at them; the scars below Steve's left eyebrow, his jaw, both still raised and pink. He ached to reach out and run a finger over them.

“I remember waking up in the hospital hurting so much I passed out. That’s all. Now If I’m lucky I go a week, maybe two where I’m good, I’m clear as a bell. Then, the fucked up vision hits, head fog, hard time finding words. After it goes I can spit out facts and figures but… my life? About all I know is where I am, mostly, and that it’s time to do some reading.”

Steve handed him another journal. 

“From Oahu.”

‘Before you ran away from home,’ Danny managed to think and not say.

“You’re gonna let me peruse your innermost musings? Unedited?” He said it lightly, but Steve stayed straight-faced, pointed. 

Danny read, turning pages, taking in the hopes that turned into fears and a decision.

 _Maybe this can get better… It’s only been a week… a month… You can trust him - trust them all….. They_ **_care_** , _they want to help…… Eight weeks. Nothing. It’s useless and they can’t accept that. He’ll_ **_never_** _accept it, shit he's stubborn....._ **_Shame_** _on you if you take the easy route, if you use them….. They’ll be fine, they’ll move on. So will you.”_

“Is that what you really think?” Danny murmured, still staring at the words. “That we all moved on, we’re all good without you?” 

“It’s what I hope.” Steve said, and Danny snapped the book shut. 

He reached up and gave in to the urge, silently tracing the lines where Steve’s jaw and skull had fractured. Steve blinked – and let him. 

“How about I show you how much I haven’t moved on?” 

Danny pulled him in and kissed him lightly on the cheek, the mouth. He had to bite back a gasp of relief when Steve relaxed into him, let him lick his lips open and fuck, there it was; the perfect slide of their tongues against each other, the warm, deep push and pull of the way Steve kissed. How had he gone almost a year without this? 

“You can’t fuck me all better, Danny,” Steve said against his ear eventually, and Danny smiled at how shaky it came out. 

“Do you want me?” He asked, felt a silent nod. “Did you want me from the minute you saw me yesterday? When I asked you out and you turned that pretty pink under all that tan?” 

“Yeah.” 

“And you think that’s not remembering? On some level? You always hand your customers a menu and get the urge to kiss ‘em?” 

“No,” Steve said. “Almost never.” 

Danny took it in the spirit intended, laughing, reaching for his hand as he got off the couch. 

“C’mon, babe. Let's go. Your room. Naked. Now.”


	5. Half Drowning, Not Fighting It...

Danny shifted for a better view of Steve in the deep blue 7:00 a.m. light, and hell it was an ego boost. He was sprawled on his back, arms flung, eyelids perfectly still. Out. The boy looked beautiful and so well laid. 

_They’d stood by the bed for minutes, losing and finding their footing as they kissed, hands roaming. Danny’s palm and fingertips teased Steve’s cock, thumb brushing slowly back and forth over the head and fuck he was so hard from just a little foreplay, tip flared wide, the balls Danny reached to cup full and sensitive. Steve leaned into him, sighing deeply, arms dropping, hands on Danny’s ass pulling him closer._

_“I know what you need.” Danny murmured. “Gonna lay you out and suck you until you’re ready to pop, flip you over, take you slow and deep. Gonna fuck you inside and out ‘til you come all over my hand, all over the bed, all over yourself….”_

_The groan that earned him was so full of 'fuck I want, fuck I need...' that it made Danny’s cock twitch and there was no more teasing; just Steve hot in his mouth, Steve’s fingers in his hair, shaking, Steve clenching so hard around him, eventually, hips jerking and faltering when the time came that Danny had to fight to stay with- fight until he was flat out, boneless, panting softly, spent._

He was stirring now, hips shifting, arms moving, and as Danny watched him wake up he realized he was holding his breath, wondering what he’d see in that face.

He got several sleepy blinks, a crooked, bleary smile, and he breathed out again, relieved.

“’Morning.” Steve reached in to kiss him lightly. 

“Good morning. Please come home.”

“Not that easy.” Steve didn’t draw back as he said it, though, physically or mentally. He seemed to have expected it. 

“Sure it is. Pack your stuff, send it UPS, get on a plane with me and…”

Steve shifted closer and up, over him, pressed him down with a hand and kissed him into silence; not trying to get him hard, just a soft, early morning face sucking that went nowhere very, very slowly.

“Can we just make out for a while? Take a shower?” Steve asked eventually. “Have some breakfast before I have to go to work and talk about it later?”

Danny had answered wordlessly, with more open, wet kisses. How could he argue when he was half drowning in every touch, taste and smell he thought he’d never have again? 

~~~~~

“You have to stay. The full two weeks,” Steve said as they stood in his galley kitchen making coffee, eggs, toast. “There’s good odds it’ll happen while you’re here. You have to see it… really see all this get wiped away like it never happened. And I need to see how you deal with it, too.”

“Not going away unless you tell me to,” Danny said. “Maybe not even then.”

“I hope not,” Steve said. “Whatever I might say later…. I really hope not.”


	6. Love =

Danny spends the morning in the resort’s ginormous pool with swim-up bar. It’s far enough away from the restaurant that he won’t feel like he’s lurking.

At lunch he does go to the restaurant because… well, food. 

“I’m almost sorry my bartender is back.” Steve’s not shy about greeting him with a kiss. “I’m working in the office today.”

“It’s all right. We’ll hang out later. Right?”

“Yeah,” Steve’s smiling as he goes. “Unless you get a better offer.”

Danny orders, and flips through the notebook Steve handed him this morning, the one he’d written in Oahu. The detective in him sees clues about why he left- some glaringly obvious, some subtler.

The one that makes him smile: _“Chin seems to be the peacemaker. Kono stirs things up. Danny wants what he wants. He wants the old me back, and screw reality for getting in his way.”_

The one that stops him cold:

_Love = 15% trust + 15% what the eye sees + 70% memory - shared history._

Danny stares out the window until his food comes. 

~~~~~~

They have dinner that night at a white linen restaurant with no windows, just three walls and a wide open view of the lights on Cruz Bay. Hawaii is beautiful, but _this_ …. Danny’s never seen anything that compares.

He wakes up in Steve’s arms again, and gets more glimpses into how he’s been living -- and it’s not all horrible. He meets his employees, who ask him not to take their boss away. Gauging from their smiles they’re rooting for him. 

He’s beginning to feel hopeful when the fog rolls in.

“You want me to stay in my own room tonight?” 

Steve’s been absent since they woke up. Distant the way someone is when they have a migraine or a tooth that just announced it needs a root canal.

“Maybe… that’d be best,” He looks relieved he didn’t have to ask. “I don’t think it’s anything, I’m just …beat, and we have a convention coming in tomorrow, and…”

“Not here to hound you, babe. Sleep. We’ll talk in the morning.”

~~~~~

“Where is he?” 

It’s noon, and Danny’s barking at Marilyn Bernbaum, clinical psychologist on his cell phone. He’s spent all morning looking for him, telling himself not to assume the worst but Steve is … gone. Again. 

“Mr. Williams, no one is going to stop you from seeing him, but you have to understand what you’re going to find when …”

“ **Where is** he?”

“The hospital.”

“What? Why?” 

“Have you ever been in the middle of a lightning storm?” she asks him gently. “The kind that shakes your whole house?”

“I live in the tropics, so... yeah.”

“Imagine that inside your skull.” 

Danny doesn’t realize how long the pause has been until she talks again.

“He is safe. You can stay at your hotel and wait for him, and spare yourself having to see….”

“Thank you. I appreciate the thought.” 

Danny’s heading for the hotel cab queue before she gets the words out.


	7. With Everything at Stake

It was too warm in the room. 

Danny stood in the doorway, Steve’s back to him in the hospital bed with his t-shirt and boxers showing, sheets twisted around his ankles. It made his temper flare - no one had checked on Steve lately. He noticed something else as he cranked the air, straightened the sheet: Steve was randomly shaking in his bed, shivering slow and deep; the gestures of someone drugged but still hurting.

“Knew you’d come.” Steve rasped, his eyes red slits.

“Yeah. Shocking, huh? Considering every entry about me in your little black books has the word ‘stubborn’ in it.” Danny took his hand, leaned in to kiss his damp temple. “Not leaving, either.”

“Stay until I’m out. Then go.”

“Nope. Not happening. See – stubborn. Your memory sucks, but your powers of…”

“Did he get away?”

Danny stared, before realization sucked the air out of his lungs. Steve was asking about the man he’d been chasing when he went over the parking garage wall. He hadn’t asked in the months before he’d left them all behind. And Danny hadn’t said. 

“No.” Danny ran his free hand over Steve’s back. “He died.”

“Was it some … random punk?”

“Of course not. Even you aren’t that crazy.” Danny stopped to pick his words. “He was someone who caused you a lot of pain. Who tore up your family and had it in for you. And I’m glad he’s dead.”

“Still won, didn’t he? He… _shit_ …” The grip on Danny’s hand tightened and Danny flinched, getting the idea maybe stress added to his misery. “He screwed up the rest of my life.” 

Danny dropped Steve’s hand to trace the IV line and saw he had a self-administering pain med system, a dose loaded up, available. He put the lever in Steve’s hand.

"Press down," Danny said.

“Stuff puts me to sleep….” 

“It’s okay. You need that.” 

Danny watched Steve’s thumb press the dispenser and he leaned in to kiss him again, to nuzzle into his neck and _hell_ , he thought - those are the feelings, the scents _no one_ gets to keep forever, bad memory or good.

He stayed, touching him, planting kisses until Steve was asleep. Then he rifled through the notebooks on the nightstand, found a pen and pulled out a chair.

“You said the man who made you fly over that wall ruined your life. Thing is, he can’t unless you let him. You left us too fast, and I know why. It sure as hell wasn’t to protect us. It was to protect you. You think we’ll give up on you, abandon you the way other people you trusted did. But we won’t. And here’s why….”

It took an hour to write it out. 

Danny set the book on the table, leaned in for one more kiss and left. Because Steve may be wrong about a lot of things, but he was right about one: Watching him wake up, and seeing nothing in those eyes? Danny couldn’t face it right now – not with everything at stake.


	8. In spite of all the heartache...

“I’m not giving up,” Danny stood outside a gift shop/restaurant, watching for the ferry from St. John to the St. Thomas airport with his phone to his ear. “I’m leaving before he’s so angry he won’t even take a call from me.”

“That bad?” Chin sounded surprised across the many miles. “I’m sorry, bra’.”

“Yeah,” Danny sighed it. “Me too.”

~~~~~

It took days for Steve to return to work, an hour for Danny steel himself and walk over. 

“Hi,” Steve had looked away then back. “How can I help, sir?”

The way he was holding himself, the darkness in his eyes, the little turndown at the corners of his mouth; Danny knew even though Steve didn’t recognize him, he was bracing for when he would appear to haunt him.

It's how Danny knew he had lost before he even got a word in.

“Did you read what I wrote?” 

Steve flinched, stepping back, eyes shooting to Danny’s. 

“Yeah. C’mon…” 

He waved him toward the garden alcove with a koi pond, and they sat. 

~~~~~

“He said it was the hardest thing he’d ever had to read. That it’s exactly why he left, because he can take from us but he can’t give back. Fuck, he was tearing up so I tried to play it down, right? Told him we’d probably barely notice the difference.”

“Stop,” Chin was chuckling. “You didn’t?”

“He laughed. Not for long, though.”

~~~~~~

“Have you considered maybe all this hurting for _me_ is really hurting for _yourself_?”

Steve is standing in his own apartment doorway, arms out wide on the door, the archway to keep Danny from walking in and Danny’s the one near tears now. 

Danny had spent days sightseeing, swimming to exhaustion, killing time ‘til Steve came looking for him. Except he never did.

“Yeah, holding you while you shake in a hospital bed and _imagining_ you there alone, no one to watch out for you? Don’t fucking _tell_ me I’m confused.”

“It’s been five days since then Danny and you’re still hurting and I **don’t remember** it!” Steve barked it and Danny stepped back. “Have you heard of caretaker burden? Know what it does to people, how it fries them from the inside out?”

“Can’t be any worse than not having you with us.”

“Go home. Call me once in awhile,” Steve had stepped back and started to shut the door. “I’m not saying you’re not allowed to care. You just can’t care so much.”

~~~~~

“ _Whoa_ , wait… what did he say to you?” Chin asked. “In the hospital, what did he say about the accident?”

Danny was answering Chin’s question, explaining exactly what it was Steve didn’t want to put him through again.

“He asked if Wo Fat got away. Well, not by name of course. He said ‘did he get away?’”

“Danny, all we ever told him is that he suffered a fall in the line of duty. It seemed a lot less cruel than saying ‘you fell five stories and nearly smashed your head open.’”

“Are you sure? We never….”

“Sure, I’m sure. You were dealing with a lot then, too, it may be fuzzy to you but I know we were really short on details with him. And there are lots of ways to fall, right? We climb hills, scale bridges, go up fire escapes. And, what, maybe one in five times we’re actually chasing a suspect?”

“He remembers,” Danny picked up his carry on duffel and headed for the cab stand. “He remembers the accident. Why the hell hasn’t he told anyone?”

“Danny, slow it down, okay? Until you talk with him, you can’t know exactly what…”

“I swear to _God_ if he remembers _something_ , anything that he didn't remember before, I’m knocking him out, stuffing his ass in a crate and shipping him home _freight_ …” 

“Danny, Danny, please do yourself a favor and.... oh, no….” Chin looked at the phone in his hand, Danny gone. “This is not going to be pretty.”


	9. Home

“Why didn’t you tell me you remember the accident?”

Danny found him at the outdoor bar totaling lunch receipts, and hell it hurt to see disappointment washing over Steve's face; hurt like getting kicked. 

“You said you were leaving.”

“In the hospital _you_ said you knew you were chasing a suspect. What do you remember?”

Steve shut the cash register and motioned for Danny to follow him to the beach.

“I was chasing a guy on top of a parking garage. I think he was aiming for the ledge, to follow it and maybe jump to another roof but he tripped. He had this…. _mean_ fucking shit-eating grin and he latched onto me when I grabbed him. I felt my feet leave the ground and… blinding pain. Guessing I hit my head. Is that how it happened?” 

“Yeah, babe,” Danny said. “And when did you remember this?”

“The other night. The first time you stayed with me. I woke up and there it was.”

“And you still remember? Even after that electrical storm in your brain? _Jesus_ , Steve.” 

Danny was back to furious, his voice rising and heads turned toward them. Steve made a motion with his hand to take it down a notch and Danny’s voice fell to a growl. 

“Has it not dawned on you that you spent time with someone who cares about you and something pretty damned important came back? What if it’s _all_ in there?” 

“ _One_ thing, Danny. Almost a year, and I remember one thing. You really want to spend the next twenty helping me remember a dozen more?”

“I swear, if you pull that ‘I’m only sparing you’ crap again I’ll lose it right here in front of these nice people. Will you please admit you _stubborn_ , stubborn man that you left us too soon? That you were afraid to need us?”

“Maybe I was.” 

Steve said it so softly that Danny stopped flat to make sure he’d really heard right.

“Well that’s it, then. I’m not asking anymore, Steve. You’re coming home. You’re giving us a year. And if we’re not all better off for it… well, we’ll deal with it then. But I am not going. Not without you. Got it?”

Danny looked out at the water, back to Steve’s sad and worried eyes and held his breath.

~~~~~~~~~~  
“You aaarrre here!” Grace ran all the way across the yard and flung herself at Steve, laughing as he scooped her up and spun her around. Danny had to look away as he walked toward them from the house.

“How awesome is that?” Kono asked as he stopped next to her and he nodded, taking the beer she’d pulled out of the cooler for him. 

It was their second weekend home, and Danny was relieved for the millionth time that Steve had only rented out, not sold his place when he left. Somehow, coming back to it helped if only on a subliminal level. 

“How’s he doing the last few days?” Chin was firing up the grill, watching Grace prattle on about school and her friends, and Steve pretending to know what she was talking about. 

“He had it rough Thursday, slept it off most of Friday. Not bad enough to need the hospital or morphine again, thank God. He woke up very confused, but I told him he’s home, he’s safe. Sometimes I wonder if he’s working through more than the accident.”

“You think?” Chin asked, and Danny huffed out a sound of agreement.

“I know it’s really soon to ask this,” Kono said. “But is he’s glad he’s back?”

“He’s restless. I told him to tell the governor he wants the open detective job. Even if he spends most of his time in the office managing case files and data he’ll be a dream compared to the temps we keep going through. And surprisingly, he doesn’t seem to mind the idea of working for me.”

“Oh, that would be so…. fantastic.”

The happy light in Kono’s eyes at the idea, and the sight of Steve and Grace bonding made Danny have to turn and look back toward the house again.

“How are _you_ doing?” Chin asked, as much to break Danny’s teary mood as anything.

“The worst day now?” Danny said. “It’s a billion times better than this past year. I just hope maybe someday…”

“I know,” Kono said. “We all do.”

~~~~~~~~~~

“Hey, sleepy,” Danny lay on his side watching Steve surface. 

He’d been awake for an hour, wanting to be there for him when those eyes opened, to pull Steve in as he was pulling him in now, to kiss him through his confusion and push away any lingering fear. 

Steve’s latest ‘brainstorm’ had been the mildest yet, but Danny didn’t dare hope that’d mean an easy morning. Every incident in the past three months had been a little different.

“You’re in Oahu. You’re home. You’re safe.”

“It’s okay, D.” 

Steve pressed Danny down on his back, leaned up over him and damn, even through his confusion Danny got the feeling that sleepy, early morning sex was on the menu. And if there were anything better on the planet than that big, warm chest pressing down on him, Steve rocking against his hip all lazy and languid and coming to life, he’d like to know what the hell it was. 

“You don’t have to run the drill for me. I know where I am. I know I’ve been home eleven weeks. I know we worked yesterday and the day before and last Sunday we slept in and made waffles and went to the Warriors game. I didn’t lose a thing this time.”

“Do you remember…” Danny looped his legs around Steve’s lower back and pushed up hard, loving the hungry little grunt he got out of him. “…anything more from before?”

“No. But I will. I know I will.”

“How do you know you will?” Danny whispered.

“Feel it right here…” Steve tapped the tip of his own tongue, then dropped down to slowly insert said tongue into Danny’s mouth and the conversation was over.

Danny felt like his heart might burst as Steve gently fucked him senseless. He was going to get him back: Their shared history, everything they’d ever meant to each other. And more importantly Steve would get himself back – a stronger self who dared to need them, who was literally an open book to them.

They kept the set of notebooks on a shelf of their own. And every so often when they needed to remember how lucky they were, they’d pull one down and read it in bed.

~~~end~~~


End file.
